Pardons & Commutations

Jonathan Braun, from Long Island, New York, was a high-ranking member of an international drug trafficking organization that smuggled more than 100,000 kilograms of marijuana from Canada into the United States using boats and private planes. At the height of the operation, prosecutors estimated the network moved more than $6 million worth of marijuana per week. Braun laundered approximately $14 million in drug proceeds through the scheme. In November 2011, Braun pleaded guilty in federal court in Brooklyn (Eastern District of New York) to conspiracy to import 1,000 kilograms or more of marijuana and conspiracy to launder drug proceeds. However, for reasons that remained sealed, his sentencing was delayed for nearly eight years. During that time — while free on bail — Braun built a significant presence in the "merchant cash advance" industry, a form of short-term business lending that critics describe as predatory. Alongside that business, he ran an illegal loan-sharking operation, and was separately convicted of extortion for using violence and threats against debtors who failed to repay. He was finally sentenced on May 28, 2019.

Conspiracy to import cocaine into the United States, and two firearms offenses (possession of machine guns and destructive devices). As two-term President of Honduras from 2014 to 2022, Hernández participated in a corrupt drug-trafficking conspiracy spanning approximately 2004 through 2022. He accepted millions of dollars in bribes from major trafficking organisations — including a $1 million contribution from Sinaloa Cartel leader Joaquín "El Chapo" Guzmán, personally delivered in 2013 to finance his presidential campaign — in exchange for using his presidential powers to shield drug traffickers from investigation and prosecution. Hernández and his co-conspirators are estimated to have facilitated the movement of more than 400 tons of cocaine destined for the United States through Honduras. A ledger seized from drug trafficker Nery Orlando López listed $440,000 in payments to "JOH y su gente" (JOH and his associates). His brother, Honduran congressman Tony Hernández, had already been convicted in the same trafficking network in 2019 and sentenced to life plus 30 years in 2021. Prosecutors described Juan Orlando Hernández as "one of the most culpable defendants ever prosecuted in the United States." He was convicted by a unanimous jury on March 8, 2024, following a three-week trial in the Southern District of New York before U.S. District Judge P. Kevin Castel. He had been extradited from Honduras — where he was arrested at US request in February 2022 — on April 21, 2022, weeks after leaving office.

James Phillip Womack is the son of Steve Womack, a Republican U.S. congressman who has represented Arkansas's 3rd congressional district since 2011. James Womack has a lengthy criminal history: in September 2018, at age 31, he was arrested on more than ten state charges involving drugs and firearms. He entered a plea agreement and in 2019 received a nine-year state prison sentence on multiple felony counts. On April 26, 2023, a federal grand jury indicted Womack on two counts: distribution of more than five grams of actual methamphetamine, and possession of a firearm as a convicted felon. He reached a plea agreement in which he pleaded guilty to the methamphetamine distribution count; the firearms charge was dismissed. On May 21, 2024, U.S. District Judge Timothy Brooks sentenced him in the Western District of Arkansas.

Newton pleaded guilty in April 2002 to one count of conspiracy to distribute and possess with intent to distribute marijuana, arising from two separate traffic stops within five weeks of each other. On November 4, 2001, police stopped Newton and two companions on Interstate 10 in St. Martin Parish, Louisiana, and discovered 213 pounds of marijuana in his white van; he and the others were charged with possession with intent to distribute and released on $100,000 bond each. While out on bail, Newton was arrested again on December 12, 2001, in Texas, when authorities found $10,000 cash in his red pickup truck and 175 pounds of marijuana — with an estimated street value of $700,000 — in the trunk of an accompanying vehicle. In total the two stops yielded nearly 390 pounds of marijuana. Newton later admitted the conduct openly, telling interviewers: "I've always been competitive, I've always been in sports. I couldn't see myself not being the biggest dope man" — and that he made up to $75,000 per deal. Under the plea agreement, additional charges of aiding and abetting distribution were dropped.

Lewis pleaded guilty in October 2004 to using a cellular telephone to facilitate a drug transaction — specifically, to helping broker a cocaine deal for his childhood friend Angelo Jackson. The underlying incident occurred on June 23, 2000, just weeks after Lewis had been selected fifth overall by the Baltimore Ravens in the NFL Draft. An FBI informant contacted Lewis by cell phone to discuss arranging a cocaine sale to Lewis and Jackson; Lewis and Jackson subsequently met the informant at an Atlanta restaurant, where both conversations were recorded. No drugs ever changed hands. Federal prosecutors initially charged Lewis with two counts: conspiracy to possess with intent to distribute cocaine (which carried a statutory minimum of ten years) and using a cell phone in furtherance of that conspiracy. Under the plea agreement, prosecutors dropped the conspiracy and attempted cocaine possession charges, leaving only the communications count to which Lewis admitted guilt.

Conspiracy to possess with intent to distribute cocaine. Henry, a former NFL running back who played for the Buffalo Bills (2001–2004), Tennessee Titans (2005–2006), and Denver Broncos (2007), was identified by federal investigators as the financier — the "money man" — behind a drug trafficking operation that moved cocaine between Denver, Colorado and Billings, Montana from approximately 2006 until his arrest in September 2008. The operation came to light when a Montana Division of Criminal Investigation undercover agent, investigating cocaine trafficking in Billings, traced the supply chain back to Denver. On September 16, 2008, a traffic stop on Interstate 90 in Montana uncovered approximately three kilograms of cocaine and six pounds of marijuana connected to the network. The conspiracy involved in excess of five kilograms of cocaine in total. Henry was arrested in the Denver area following an undercover sting and pleaded guilty to a single count in April 2009.

Joe Angelo Sotelo (also known as "Baby Joe" and Joseph A. Sotelo III) was a key participant in the Fort Worth cocaine distribution organization run by his brother Edward Ruben Sotelo. The conspiracy, which operated from 1990 through January 1995, distributed more than 280 kilograms of cocaine — used largely as crack — across the Fort Worth area, along with at least 100 pounds of marijuana. Joe Sotelo was charged alongside his brother and four other co-defendants in a twelve-count federal indictment. A jury convicted him of two counts: conspiracy to possess cocaine with intent to distribute, and possession of cocaine with intent to distribute (aiding and abetting). He was a central figure in a June 1993 incident that became evidence at trial: after purchasing five kilograms of cocaine from supplier Juan Robles — who took payment but delivered flour — Joe Sotelo participated in the kidnapping of Robles's fourteen-year-old brother Gilberto to recover the money. The Fifth Circuit affirmed the convictions of all defendants in 1996 (97 F.3d 782). In 2019, Sotelo sought a sentence reduction under Amendment 782 to the Sentencing Guidelines, which retroactively lowered drug offense levels. The district court denied the motion, finding that his career offender status (criminal history category VI) controlled his guidelines range and Amendment 782 did not lower it. The Fifth Circuit affirmed on October 31, 2019 (No. 19-10412).

Larry Hoover was born in Jackson, Mississippi in 1950 and moved to Chicago's South Side as a child. At 13 he dropped out of school and joined a street gang. In 1969, Hoover and David Barksdale merged their respective factions — the Supreme Gangsters and the Black Disciples — into what became the Black Gangster Disciple Nation. After Barksdale's death in 1974, Hoover took sole control and, under the alias "King Larry," built the organization — by then known as the Gangster Disciples — into one of the most expansive street gangs in American history. Even after being convicted of murder in an Illinois state court in December 1973 — for ordering the execution of 19-year-old William "Pooky" Young, whom Hoover suspected of stealing from gang drug stash houses, and who was shot in the head six times and dumped in an alley in Chicago's Englewood neighborhood — Hoover continued to run the Gangster Disciples from prison. By the early 1990s, prosecutors alleged the organization had approximately 30,000 members across 35 states and generated roughly $100 million a year in drug revenue. Beginning in 1993, federal investigators gained court approval to place hidden transmitters inside visitor badges given to gang leaders who met with Hoover in person, allowing them to monitor what jailhouse phone calls could not. The resulting 17-year joint investigation by the FBI, ATF, DEA, and the Illinois Department of Corrections culminated in Hoover's federal indictment on August 22, 1995. On May 9, 1997, a federal jury found Hoover guilty on all 40 counts: narcotics conspiracy, continuing criminal enterprise, use of persons under the age of 18 to conduct drug transactions, distribution of cocaine, use of a firearm in the commission of a drug trafficking crime, extortion, and laundering of drug proceeds. The verdict covered criminal conduct Hoover had orchestrated entirely while already serving a state prison term for murder.

Michael Ray Harris — known widely as "Harry-O" — was born in Los Angeles in 1960. After dropping out of West Los Angeles Community College and quitting his job before his 20th birthday, he built one of the most expansive street-level cocaine and crack operations in Southern California's history. Working alongside his brother David, and drawing on networks that included both Bloods and Crips sets as well as the Cali Cartel, Harris grew his drug enterprise to a reported $2 million in daily revenue. Alongside the drug operation, he invested proceeds into legitimate Los Angeles businesses — a deli, a beauty salon, a limousine service, an electrical company, and a theatrical production company — including financing the 1988 Broadway play Checkmates, which marked Denzel Washington's debut on that stage. In 1987, before the federal case, Harris received a 28-year California state prison sentence for the kidnapping and attempted murder of James Lester, a relative and member of his own drug ring. He was subsequently charged in federal court for the drug operation itself. On November 26, 1990, Harris was convicted in federal court of conspiracy to possess with intent to distribute cocaine and aiding and abetting possession with intent to distribute cocaine. The federal conviction covered the large-scale cocaine distribution network he had run across multiple states. From prison, Harris played a pivotal behind-the-scenes role in American music history. In late 1991, he connected his attorney David Kenner with Marion "Suge" Knight, and invested $1.5 million to co-found Godfather Entertainment — the parent company of Death Row Records, which went on to launch the careers of Dr. Dre, Snoop Dogg, and Tupac Shakur, and generate hundreds of millions of dollars in sales. Because he was incarcerated, his wife Lydia formally held his stake. Death Row is widely credited as one of the most commercially dominant — and culturally consequential — hip-hop labels in history.

Andre Donnell Routt was convicted of conspiracy to knowingly and intentionally distribute and possess with intent to distribute five kilograms or more of cocaine, prosecuted in the Eastern District of Texas (Case No. 1:94-CR-12). His trial ran May 24–31, 1994 before Judge Cobb. The scale of the operation was large. The Fifth Circuit, reviewing a sentence reduction appeal in 2016, confirmed that Routt was held responsible for 42.5 kilograms and four ounces of crack cocaine and 150 kilograms of powder cocaine — quantities equivalent to more than 90,000 kilograms of marijuana under Sentencing Guidelines calculations. His base offense level was 38, with six additional specific offense enhancements, yielding a total offense level of 44 and a criminal history category of IV.

Edward Ruben Sotelo ran one of Fort Worth's most prominent cocaine distribution organizations through the late 1980s and into the 1990s. Federal prosecutors described the Sotelo operation as responsible for distributing more than 280 kilograms of cocaine — used largely as crack — as well as at least 100 pounds of marijuana across the Fort Worth area. The conspiracy ran from 1990 through January 1995. A twelve-count federal indictment charged Sotelo and five co-defendants, including his brother Joeangelo Sotelo Jr. (Joe), with the conspiracy. The case included a June 1993 kidnapping incident in which, after a supplier named Juan Robles accepted payment for five kilograms of cocaine but delivered flour instead, Edward and Joe Sotelo and two associates abducted Robles's fourteen-year-old brother Gilberto in order to recover the money. Gilberto was struck but sustained only minor injury. A jury convicted Edward Sotelo of five counts: operating a continuing criminal enterprise (CCE), possession of cocaine with intent to distribute, use of a communication facility to commit a felony, possession of marijuana with intent to distribute, and distribution of cocaine. The Fifth Circuit affirmed his convictions in 1996 (97 F.3d 782).

Charles "Duke" Tanner grew up in Gary, Indiana and began boxing at age six, training under mentors including Angelo Dundee, who famously trained Muhammad Ali. He turned professional at 18 and won his first 19 fights, including a televised bout on ESPN. When boxing injuries disrupted his career and financial pressure mounted — he had a young son to support — Tanner says he turned to the streets. Along with two of his brothers, he became involved in a nonviolent drug trafficking conspiracy. Tanner was arrested after accepting 15 kilograms of fake cocaine as part of a police sting. He was convicted on two counts: conspiracy to possess with intent to distribute cocaine, and attempt to possess with intent to distribute cocaine. He was sentenced on May 26, 2009 to 360 months (30 years) in federal prison — a term the REFORM Alliance described as a "double-life sentence" — along with 10 years' supervised release and a $1,000 fine. It was his first drug offense. Both of his parents died while he and his brothers were incarcerated.

Jimmy Ray Barnett was convicted on multiple counts arising from a methamphetamine and amphetamine distribution conspiracy prosecuted in the Northern District of Texas. The charges, as recorded in the DOJ clemency warrant, were: conspiracy and aiding and abetting; possession with intent to distribute 50 grams or more of methamphetamine; possession with intent to distribute 50 grams or more of amphetamine; possession with intent to distribute methamphetamine; and being a convicted felon in possession of firearms. The felon-in-possession count indicates Barnett had prior felony convictions predating this federal case — consistent with a 1990 Texas Court of Criminal Appeals record showing a probation revocation for amphetamine possession.

Zechariah Benjamin was convicted by a jury in the Northern District of Iowa in 2008 on multiple counts of distributing and conspiring to distribute crack cocaine (cocaine base). The specific charges were: distributing and aiding and abetting the distribution of 5 grams or more of cocaine base after having been convicted of two prior felony drug offenses; a second count of distributing 5 grams or more of cocaine base after two prior felony drug offenses; and conspiracy to distribute and possess with intent to distribute 50 grams or more of cocaine base after two prior felony drug offenses. The prior felony drug convictions that triggered the enhanced sentencing were at least two prior convictions for delivering cocaine in Illinois. Under 21 U.S.C. § 841(b)(1)(A) as it stood at the time, two prior felony drug convictions combined with the drug quantities involved made life imprisonment the mandatory minimum — the sentencing judge had no discretion to impose a lesser term. Benjamin subsequently sought relief under § 404 of the First Step Act of 2018, which made the Fair Sentencing Act's crack cocaine reforms retroactively applicable. The district court denied his motion, and the Eighth Circuit affirmed that denial nine days before his commutation.

Jean Pinkard was a nurse practitioner from Farmington Hills, Michigan, who was 63 years old at the time of her indictment. She was among nineteen people charged in June 2020 by the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Eastern District of Michigan in connection with a large-scale illegal opioid prescription scheme centered on the Detroit area. The scheme was run by John Henry Rankin III, who owned and managed two rehabilitation clinics — New Vision Rehab and Preferred Rehab. From September 2017 through June 2020, Rankin paid doctors, nurse practitioners, and other medical professionals, including Pinkard, to write prescriptions for controlled substances for "fake patients" who had no legitimate medical need for the drugs. At times, prescriptions were written for patients who were never examined, with patient names simply provided so that prescriptions and charts could be completed without any encounter taking place. Patient recruiters — referred to in court documents as "marketers" — were paid to maintain a supply of fake patients and funnel them through the clinics. The drugs prescribed included Schedule II opioids: oxycodone, oxymorphone, Percocet (oxycodone-acetaminophen), hydrocodone, and hydrocodone-acetaminophen, as well as promethazine with codeine cough syrup. The medical professionals named in the indictment collectively prescribed more than 1,951,148 dosage units of Schedule II controlled substances. The oxycodone and oxymorphone alone carried a conservative street value of more than $41 million. Pinkard reached a plea agreement and was convicted of conspiracy to possess with intent to distribute and to distribute controlled substances.

Angela Reynolds received and distributed methamphetamine in the Dallas-Fort Worth area as part of a larger drug conspiracy. Federal agents identified her as a suspect, obtained a warrant to search her home, and found two bags of methamphetamine inside. Reynolds subsequently cooperated with investigators and assisted in the arrest of other members of the conspiracy. She was charged alongside ten co-defendants and pleaded guilty to a conspiracy to possess with intent to distribute a controlled substance. At sentencing, Reynolds was held responsible for approximately 1.7 kilograms of pure methamphetamine: 44.75 grams of a methamphetamine mixture seized from her home, plus 1.701 kilograms she admitted to receiving from co-defendants. Her presentence report assigned a total offense level of 37 and criminal history category VI — the highest possible — reflecting multiple prior felony convictions, which also classified her as a career offender under the Sentencing Guidelines. The advisory guideline range was 360 months to life, capped at 360 to 480 months by the statutory 40-year maximum.

Angela Wannette Cupit, 41, was part of a methamphetamine distribution conspiracy prosecuted in the Northern District of Texas. In August 2015 she pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to possess with intent to distribute 50 grams or more of methamphetamine. Two co-defendants — Shawn Travis Cathey and Phillip Schenck — pleaded guilty to the same charge in the same proceeding, with six further co-defendants also charged in the conspiracy. The investigation was conducted by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms, the Drug Enforcement Administration, and the Texas Department of Public Safety.

Juan Mercado III was convicted on two counts in the Southern District of Texas, sentenced on December 12, 2012. The primary count was conspiracy to possess with intent to distribute 2,160.02 kilograms of marijuana — over two metric tons. The second count was a supervised release violation arising from a prior federal conviction for conspiracy to possess with intent to distribute five kilograms or more of cocaine, indicating Mercado had previously been convicted of a serious federal drug offense and was still under court supervision when the marijuana conspiracy occurred.

Anabel Valenzuela and her husband Benjamin Acuna led a large drug trafficking organization that operated from Las Vegas and shipped thousands of pounds of methamphetamine to Hawaii between 2002 and September 2005. The organization distributed approximately 2,000 pounds of methamphetamine in Hawaii, generating around $8 million in profits. The scheme was uncovered through a three-year investigation by the Drug Enforcement Administration and the IRS Criminal Investigation division in Las Vegas, resulting in the prosecution and conviction of 23 people. Valenzuela was convicted by a jury in federal court in Hawaii alongside Acuna and a third defendant, Eddy Olguin. In addition to her prison sentence, she forfeited her interests in five Las Vegas properties and was ordered to forfeit an $8 million judgment representing the organization's drug proceeds.

Garnett Gilbert Smith — also known as Abdule Jones and Brian Slack — ran one of the most significant cocaine distribution operations prosecuted by federal authorities in Baltimore in recent years. According to the DEA, Smith was responsible for distributing more than 1,000 kilograms of cocaine over the course of less than two years. At his January 2014 sentencing, Gary Tuggle, then the assistant special agent in charge of the DEA's Baltimore field office, described Smith as "one of the largest cocaine and heroin dealers to be arrested by the DEA in recent history." Before his arrest, Smith displayed an extravagant lifestyle that prosecutors detailed in court. He owned a fleet of high-end cars, stayed at the Montage Hotel in Beverly Hills, and spent hundreds of thousands of dollars at Gucci, Cartier, and Louis Vuitton. He was convicted in federal court of one count of conspiracy to distribute and possess with intent to distribute cocaine.